About Viv Jones

I am Viv, stay at home mom (mummy) to Edison who is 4 and Arlo who is 3. I am married to my best friend and university sweetheart Steve. In October 2014 we moved 5321 miles from our beautiful Victorian home in Sheffield, England to Anaheim Hills and are loving the wild adventure this move has turned our life into. I am so very grateful that this move has given me the opportunity to quit my kinder teacher role to stay home with my crazy whirlwinds and enjoy the adventures of modern motherhood. I love farmers markets with my little foodies, antique shops, restoring antique finds, reading, baking, eating out and trying not to spend everything we have in Target! Oh and chips. I LOVE chips (crisps for any Brits reading this). All the chips.

Author Archive | Viv Jones

My youngest little boy is 4, and one of the funniest kids you’ll ever meet. But only if he lets you into his world. You see, Arlo is autistic. I’d like to tell you Arlo’s story; about his autism, his surprise autism diagnosis, and why it came as such a shock to us. We always […]

My husband is a golfer. He has been a golfer as long as I’ve known him. I know there are more partners of golfers out there. So, you know you’re a golf widow when… You casually prepare plans around golfing weekends – there’s no point making a fuss so you just embrace his loss for […]

Date night. The Holy Grail for most parents. We all need time together to reconnect. Get out there and have some fun! When we first moved here I had no idea what fun there was to be had in the local area so I would ask my friends what they liked to do and I […]

They say beauty is in the eye of the beholder. But shouldn’t we be teaching our children that real beauty is about loving YOU? I want my boys to understand not all people look like the people you see in magazines, on billboards, and in movies. I want them to know that sometimes people have […]

We have been in Anaheim Hills for 2 years now, so I think I am qualified to write a post that is a Brit’s guide to the best stores in the US! I have extensively researched (Ask my husband. Or Chase) so here is my list. I am open to suggestions of other places I […]

Anaheim Moms Blog has partnered with Access Change Fitness Academy to bring you this post, but as always our opinions are our own!I recently spend two week trying out Access Change, a gym in Yorba Linda which is literally everything I want in a gym – this place is my kind of gym! The owners […]

Help – I think I am having a mom life crisis! Send cookies and wine… Have you ever had a mom life crisis? You know, that moment where you look back at your pre-mummy life and realise HOW MUCH has changed. Where you spend moments longing for your life pre-kids when less than 10 hours […]

Boys and pink; why is it socially unacceptable? Our girls are ‘allowed’ to like ‘boys toys’ and dress in ‘boys clothes’ but when a boy likes pink it is considered so taboo. Still. In 2016! Boys are shamed by adults into believing they cannot like ‘girl things’. It is so ingrained in some of our […]

Halloween. It is a great American tradition. In the UK it isn’t ‘done’ like it is here. So here are some reasons why this British mama LOVES Halloween in America. Pumpkin patches OH THE PUMPKIN PATCHES! We get at least 2 or 3 visits in a year. This year our favourite ones have been […]

So think I am a social nomad. This is new to me. I am lucky to be able to say I have a lot of friends and I always have. As someone who has lived in many places I have groups from different stages of my life, but they are all very defined groups. My […]

To my biggest baby as you start school, Somehow 5 years have rushed by and it is time for you to start Kindergarten. I’m lucky, if we had still been in England I would have lost you to ‘big school’ last year, but somehow I still don’t feel quite ready for things to change. It […]

I want people to know why ‘me time’ is important in our family. It’s something so many mummies don’t get enough of. Either by choice, or by necessity, or by circumstance. We knew when we had our first 5 years ago that ‘me time’ was going to be something we placed importance on. I fully […]

My toddler recently had a tonsillectomy and adenoidectomy and I am just about surviving! While it is fresh in my mind I thought I would go through the things that have helped us get through these 2 weeks. Before the Surgery We got a great book called Good bye tonsils which helped hugely. We read it […]

I didn’t chose to be a stay at home mummy. Sometimes I feel like I shouldn’t tell people that, like I need to be constantly and eternally grateful to have the gift of staying home with my boys. But you know what? It’s hard. And it is made even harder by the idea some […]

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